Genetics - Designer Babies

Adiba Afros

Grade 10

Science- Biology

Genetics

Designer Babies

The horizon of gene technology broadens everyday along with the imagination of every human being. Designer babies a rather amusing as well as a controversial field in science could one day change the living world.

The term ‘designer babies’ is used by people like journalists. A more scientific term would be ‘genetically modified babies’. Designing babies is actually more of a general term as this covers lots of different areas within. There are a number of methods, which are described as designed babies. One is screening embryo to detect any genetic diseases that is present in the child. Once they find the faulty genes they can modify them so that the child is born healthy and doesn’t have to worry about the disease or passing it on to its own offspring. The same technique is also applied to detect and modify embryos with unknown diseases that could prove to be very dangerous.

Another technique helps determine the sex of the baby. In this process the sperm cells are divided into two groups, one which is likely to produce a male baby and the other group which likely to produce female. This selection is done before fertilization. The sperm with the sex of the parents’ desire is selected and then inserted in the egg for fertilization.

InVitro Fertilization is basically the more scientific term for the process of creating test-tube babies. It’s when the sperm and egg are fertilized inside a test tube within a lab, to prevent the child from getting any genetic diseases. Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis is also a process for the same cause; in this particular process embryos are screened and the ones that are likely to carry the genetic disease are removed and the healthy ones are used.

It is believed by many scientists that in the future of designer babies they will even modifying the cosmetic features of babies. Some of the physical features that can be changed in the future are the hair color and type, eye color and height. Some believe that it will even be possible to modify babies’ intelligence, personality, athleticism and beauty. An article in goes as follows:

“In April 2001 the first genetically modified monkey was born - he was called Andi (representing 'Inserted DNA' backwards). Andi was made from an unfertilized egg into which scientists had inserted a jellyfish gene called green fluorescent protein. This egg was then fertilized with normal monkey sperm. Andi glowed green In ultra violet light, showing for the first time that it is possible to change the genetic make-up of a primate by inserting a gene into the egg.”

This clearly proves those scientists aren’t far from changing the physical characteristics of humans and that the concept can be made real. It is also believed that in the future, scientists will be able to prevent diabetes, heart diseases and even life threatening diseases such as HIV.

There are a certain number of advantages in creating ‘designer babies’. Firstly, the screening and modifying of embryo’s process can help babies get rid of genetic diseases and have a healthy life from birth; this might even prevent the family’s future generations from getting the disease. Some of the common hereditary diseases that can now be detected through this process are cystic fibrosis and Huntington’s disease. It could also help scientists detect any new diseases and can get rid of it from the start. If parents’ know that their babies are going to die from diseases or illnesses at a very young age than they can save the emotional strain by getting rid of the disease before birth through the screening process.

Determining the sex of the baby could help them avoid diseases like hemophilia and Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, which only affects males. If the family is known to have hemophilia or Muscular Dystrophy in their family then through the screening process they can see whether the child is going to suffer from it in life. Since such diseases only affect males the parents then could have a girl instead to avoid the diseases.

This could also help parents conceive healthy babies. Many parents try very hard to have a baby and spend a lot of money on the process. ...

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This could also help parents conceive healthy babies. Many parents try very hard to have a baby and spend a lot of money on the process. So why not have a perfect ‘designer baby’ if all they have to do is spent a bit more money. If scientists are able to work their way through to modifying babies mentally than it is also expected to help prevent children from getting addicted to alcohol or suffer from any types of mental illnesses. It probably will even be possible to provide ‘designer babies’ with better eye sight, intelligence and health.

The common and legal use of ‘designer babies’ is to detect the baby to know whether it has any type of diseases that would affect it in life. However, there are parents who have genetically modified babies as a donor for organs, tissues or bone marrow to cure their previously born child. One example as such is the following:

“
(various sources through 5 Jan 01)
A U.S. couple with a daughter suffering from a rare form of anemia gave birth to a healthy son, conceived in a lab and selected when still an embryo because he did not have the disease. They decided to have the child at least partly because his tissues could help treat his sister. This case marks the first time treatment for another person been a consideration in embryo selection. Early reports indicate the therapy .”

This has saved the girl from her disease but how would the brother feel when he knows that he was born ‘partly’ to save his sister not just to be a part of the family?

On the other hand there are several arguments against the consequences of ‘designer babies’. One is a real life example of misusing this technology:

“In the United States a deaf lesbian couple has intentionally had two deaf children by using sperm from a man who had a long family history of deafness. This couple deliberately chose to bring a child into the world with a disability.”

Is this fair on the child? If the child knew that he/she could be born without the disability of being born deaf how would they feel? Of course they could’ve been born without it but it’s not their fault that they were born deaf; they wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it at the first place. Is it right for the parents to have complete power over the child’s destiny?

Most parents would want to the have the ‘perfect’ baby, but how would it affect the child later in its life? If a child is given a particular characteristic to be born with, there’s a possibility of it being passed on to the child’s future generations but what if the child didn’t want it to be like that? And so the choices aren’t just about what the parents’ desire but how it is going to affect their child later in their life.

If a baby is genetically modified and created to save their sibling, the choice could affect the child later in his/her life when he/she will get to know about their birth. The child might feel left out or an ‘extra’ in the family. He/she might feel that they were born for the sole purpose of helping their sibling/s stay alive. Also the child should have every right to know and hiding the fact from them wouldn’t help the parents in any way and as a matter of fact would make things worse if the child found out from someone else. It is also possible for the child to be mistreated and segregated from society.

Also having a baby of the parents’ desired sex could lead to a major global problem, the imbalance of sexes. There could be a larger number of girls than boys or the opposite. Also if the parents spend a lot of money on having a baby of their desired sex and if the results go wrong, what will happen to the baby? It is possible for the child to have a difficult life with the parents or even the society, he or she might not even be accepted if every parent there has babies of their desired sex of a certain sex. The parents might as well mistreat the child or not give him/her equal share of the family. There are already a number of cases of the degrading of certain sex. One example as such is in Southeast Asia in Bangladesh where in the rural areas people prefer to have girl babies rather than boys. And by encouraging this sex selection could cause the problem to spread all over the world.

Modifying the phenotype of babies has not yet been discovered, however, it is believed that it will be possible in the future. Even though the concept sounds very exciting, the consequences could create some serious issues in the world. Firstly, this could lead to eugenics. The creation of ‘perfect’ babies with a higher level of intelligence, beauty, athleticism and free from any diseases, illness or weaknesses could cause the imperfect ones to suffer. There could be a major division in society where one group would be of the highly intelligent ‘perfect’ beings and the other of not so perfect beings. Also the imperfect group would mostly consist of poor people as having a ‘designer baby’ is really expensive and only the rich can afford them. The gap between the societies’s rich and poor would increase even more.

In the future, if creating ‘designer babies’ increases than insurance companies probably wouldn’t want to insure a non-genetically modified child. For if a child suffers from a genetic disease than they would question them for not have a ‘designer baby’ as it wouldn’t have been a problem in the child’s life. This way the parents would be forced to have a ‘designer baby/s’. However, going back to the money issue the poor wouldn’t be able to have any type of insurance as they wouldn’t be able to afford it.

Similarly to the Second World War where Adolph Hitler tried to wipe out the disabled and what he considered the imperfect people to have a world just of ‘perfect’ humans, in the future the same thing could happen. The people with diseases and imperfection would be segregated and even discriminated. The same could work the other way round and the genetically modified people could be degraded by the others and seen as ‘unnatural’ human beings.

To achieve these results to create ‘designer babies’ thousands of animals are being experimented with and within the courses they suffer a lot and many don’t even survive. Is it fair on the animals? Many animals suffer greatly due to experimental problems, many die but however there are those who don’t and have to live with terrible disabilities and suffer all their life. One failed experiment on pigs goes as follows:

“Horizon looks at an experiment carried out on pigs to make them bigger and leaner, which involved the introduction of a gene which encouraged the production of human growth hormone.

But the uncontrolled hormone crippled the pigs, gave them stomach ulcers and caused their internal organs to fail.”

Same considerations apply to animals as to human beings, why should they be treated like objects for experimenting with and have a disabled life when it would’ve been possible for them to be healthy. And if things went worse with humans than it might even lead to mutation.

It is also possible that in the process of creating a designer baby, things could go wrong and could cause the child to be born with similar disabilities as the animals for which they have to suffer for the rest of their life. Their parents choices for having a perfect child might not always be ‘perfect’ and would affect them to suffer for the rest of their lives.

Other experiments on animals sometimes do work out but it is possible for them to be a threat to the human race. Many scientists have been trying to experiment ways to create children with higher level of intelligence or ‘super-humans’. They carried out their experiments in chimpanzees an article on the experiment goes as follows:

“The potential problems posed in designing a super-human are myriad. For a start, the technology would have to be tested on animals, probably chimpanzees, whose genetic make-up is almost identical to our own.

And if the tests were carried out on, for example, intelligence genes, they stand a real possibility in resulting in chimpanzees with a greater intellectual capacity than human beings.”

As far fetched, or to be more literal, crazy, as this sounds this could actually be possible. Humans could end up in the position of chimpanzees today and them in ours.

From religious perspectives, the concept of creating ‘designer babies’ is also limited. Many religions may consider this only if its sole purpose is to free children of unwanted diseases or illness. However, the prospect of ‘acting God’ by creating a child with parents personalized characteristics is strictly tabooed in many religions such as Islam. The who business of meddling around with people’s genes and creating new life through and unnatural process has been forbidden in many religious societies and an entire realm of genetically modified people would probably lead to religious disputes and even aggression.

In many countries, the choices for creating ‘designer babies’ are limited. In countries like the United Kingdom, United States, Italy, France, Spain and a few others, the creation of ‘designer babies’ are legal for the solitary purpose of prevention from genetic diseases. Other than that changing the sex (unless it is to prevent a gender-related disease) or any other genotype or phenotype is illegal. However, there have been several illegal cases, where parents chose the sex of their baby and genotypes (e.g. the deaf babies by the deaf lesbian couples; mentioned earlier in page 3). However, in Germany, determining the gender of the baby is illegal even if its purpose is associated with gender-linked diseases. However, most of these countries laws do not put as strict rules against experimenting with animals. In Finland, France, Spain, Portugal and even Germany, experimenting with animals is legal. Creating ‘designer babies’ would probably have developed a lot further if it wasn’t for the limitations set by the governments in these countries for these countries especially USA and UK is where this is practiced and has developed a lot.

It’s quite hard to write a balanced report on such a topic for the disadvantages are more than the advantages in creating ‘designer babies’ and developing this concept. To draw conclusions to this topic, we have to think whether it is right to give parents the choices to modify their own children. Should they be allowed so much power over their children’s destiny? We also have to think about how it is going to affect our religious ethics as well as our personal ethics. All fields of science have its limitations and so does this. The more the scientist study and work through this, the more they will find out about it. But the question is when is the time to stop them? Through the progression of discoveries there will be many that could prove to be a threat to the current global society. Eugenics is one to name as such. And also if many children’s lives are to be ruined because of this who would be to blame? Would it be the parents for making the choices at the first place? The scientists who discovered the concept and brought it up to the rest of the world? Or the government for not being able to control the purpose of creating ‘designer babies’?

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